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Millennium Line

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The Millennium Line is the second line in the SkyTrain rapid transit system in Greater Vancouver, Canada. The line is owned and operated by TransLink.

History

When the Expo Line opened in 1985, an extension to Lougheed Mall in the east Burnaby was proposed. The most likely junction point for the spur to Lougheed Mall would have been from Royal Oak Station, up Edmonds Ave. to Lougheed Mall. This plan was never realized. Finally in the late 1990s, the British Columbia government announced that an entirely new line would be built from VCC-Clark Station to Columbia Station via Lougheed Mall (served by Lougheed Town Centre Station), as the first phase of the "T-Line" outlined in the GVRD's Livable Region Strategic Plan that extended into Coquitlam. The government's choice of Bombardier's technology meant that the first phase of the line would have to connect to the existing Expo Line to use its maintenance yard. Connecting the two lines at Broadway Station was deemed too impracticable, so the lines were connected in New Wstminster.. Switches to the Millennium Line were installed on the Expo Line at the north end of the Skybridge. Expo Line service was reduced to a single track over the Skybridge during the installation of these switches. The second phase of the Millennium Line was to be an extension from Lougheed Mall to Coquitlam (then known as the Port Moody-Coquitlam (PMC) Line), which would have provided a "one seat ride" from Coquitlam to VCC-Clark Station. Switches to the PMC Line were installed to the east of Lougheed Town Centre Station and a third platform was roughed-in in anticipation of the extension. Phase II was cancelled following a change in provincial government.

The Millennium Line opened in 2002, with Lake City Way Station opening a year later in 2003. Provision for a future station just east of the New Westminster tunnel, at Woodlands, also exists. There are no current plans to construct this station.

Millennium Line trains follow the Expo Line from Waterfront to Columbia, then loop back into Vancouver via a new route, terminating at VCC-Clark Station. There is a connection to Broadway Station on the Expo Line at the Commercial Drive Station. For a few months before full opening of the line, trains ran only as far as Braid Station in eastern New Westminster.

Route description

The Millennium Line route map

The Millennium Line tracks pass through a tunnel for about 1 km east of Columbia Station, then are elevated above the CN/BNSF right-of-way through eastern New Westminster. The tracks run through Coquitlam, south of the Trans-Canada Highway to Lougheed Town Centre. There are currently no stations in Coquitlam, but original plans for the line proposed a "finger" looping into Coquitlam with a station at Mallairdville, but this was deleted following opposition from the community. From Lougheed Town Centre, the line is elevated, running down the middle or along the side of Lougheed Highway to just west of Brentwood Town Centre, where it picks up the CN/BNSF right-of-way again, being elevated until Renfrew Station, then travelling through the Grandview Cut to Commercial Drive and then on to VCC-Clark Station.

List of stations

From Waterfront to Columbia Stations, Expo and Millennium Line trains stop at the same stations.

Paired with Expo Line

Millennium Line

Rupert station

Future extensions

West extension

A long-term proposal exists to extend the line further west first along Great Northern Way on the ex-Finning land, with a couple of further possibilities:

  • south to Main Street and Broadway, running under 10th Avenue, through the Mount Pleasant and Fairview neighbourhoods in Vancouver south of False Creek, to serve the commercial and hospital area along central Broadway, including a connection to the Broadway/City Hall station on the Canada Line. The terminus of this proposed route would be at either Arbutus, Burrard, or Granville Street toward the University of British Columbia main campus. Or;
  • continuing along 2nd Avenue to the Canada Line False Creek South station on Cambie Street.

Evergreen Line

In Coquitlam, an extension of the Millennium Line from Lougheed Town Centre Station to Coquitlam Town Centre was proposed when the original Millennium Line was built, and the necessary junction tracks already exist at Lougheed Town Centre Station. At the present, however, there are plans to build a tram line (the Evergreen Line) instead of the SkyTrain line, which means that the junction tracks will remain unused.

See also

  • TransLink - The agency that owns and operates SkyTrain.


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